Disclaimer- I do not own Pokemon, Yu-Yu-Hakusho, Rurouni Kenshin, any of the Final Fantasy's, Harry Potter, Princess Mononoke, Dragonball Z, any of the Tekken's, or any other anime/games/books I have in this story. I do however, own the OC's which are not many.
This story is dedicated to the late Rick Powell, who was my 7th grade Ela teacher. It is because of him that I was inspired to write for the heck of it and to have fun with my writing.
Oh snap! It's been a while since I updated this story! Sorry to all of those who were waiting on it (if any). So please sit back, relax, and enjoy reading this chapter!
Ch.5- Soreness and First Loves
To say that it was extremely easy for the seniors to make the football team would be an understatement. If you look past the fact that every single one of the seniors trying out had made it to varsity, you saw that about two or three freshmen had made it. And considering the fact that the seniors were incredibly skilled and were working their butts off, that was saying something.
As Ash dragged himself to the bus stop along with Misty on the Monday after tryouts, he was bent over double and whining.
"My calves are killing me!" he cried in anguish, while plopping down on the sidewalk to soothe his aching muscles.
"You know what Ash, you're just a big baby! Its not like exercising is gonna kill you!" said Misty exasperatedly, finally getting fed up with all of Ash's complaining.
"Well when your coaches are an x-body builder and an x-boxer/actor/nearly wrestler, tell me and we'll see if your not sore or on the verge of death!" retorted Ash angrily.
Misty seemed to ignore all of this as she spotted a group of eight teenagers that consisted of Yusuke, Botan, Hiei, Keiko, Kurama, Kuwabara, Shizuru, and Yukina heading towards them at a leisurely pace blocking out the slowly rising sun.
Out of nowhere, Misty said, "You know, I think Hiei and Keiko would make a really cute couple! They're perfect for eachother!"
"Yeah," said Ash sarcastically, "and fire and gasoline make water." Misty threw him an evil glare.
"I'm serious, but what do you think?" she asked pulling her eyes away from the slowly approaching group.
"Well personally, I always thought that Yusuke and Keiko would get together you know? They always seem to know what the other is thinking and if one's in trouble the other one's there to cover or beat the shit out of the person who's getting them in trouble." Ash said as he thought deeply for the second time that year.
"You've got a point there Ashy-boy, you have got a point." With that, Misty turned to greet the group of girls as they reached the bus stop.
Soujiro could hardly walk. He took two steps and then he stumbled nearly tripping for the fourth time in the span of two seconds. Thankfully, Misao, Kenshin and Karou were there to support him physically, as well as mentally.
"C'mon Soujiro, I know you can do it! Just three more blocks to the bus stop!" shouted Karou supportively, as she and Kenshin caught him this time, seeing as how it was Misao's turn to rest.
"I can't feel my legs!" Soujiro shouted hysterically as he was righted again, "Are my legs even attached to me!" He pulled his hands away from Kenshin and Karou, and went to feel for his legs. Finding them, he sighed in relief, and fell to the pavement.
"Whoops, hah, guess I wasn't paying attention!" said Misao as she received glares from all three of her fellow teens. She reached down and picked Soujiro up hurriedly, and instead of removing her arm, kept it under his shoulder just in case he decided to fall again.
Their faces passed millimeters from eachother and they couldn't help but stop and stare into the other's eyes. Soujiro into deep pools of emerald and Misao into absorbing orbs of blue/gray.
'God she's got beautiful eyes.' thought Soujiro as his eyes remained locked with Misao's.
'God he's got sexy eyes,' Misao thought, and then added, 'and a freakin' hot body!' Misao blushed as she realized what she had just thought. 'Bad Misao! Bad! Where the hell did that come from?"
"Hello, are you two lovebirds gonna come to school today, or are we gonna have to drag you?" Karou shouted loudly as she saw what was going on. 'Interesting,' she thought, then with an evil smirk, added, 'very, very interesting.'
Both teens blushing madly now, they quickly detached from one another and Misao quickly caught up to Kenshin and Karou.
After a couple seconds, there was a rather painful sounding THUMP from behind them, which after the strangled yelp of "Help!" they realized was Soujiro, Kenshin ran back to help the still sore Tenken.
"Oh God! My legs! Why the heck aren't you sore Himura!" Soujiro asked Kenshin angrily.
"Just lucky I guess!" said Kenshin happily.
Soujiro tried to kick him, but missed, threw himself off balance, and landed on his still sore butt.
"Tsk, tsk, you should be more careful now that you aren't able to run more than five meters without support." Kenshin laughed mockingly.
'Evil, evil little bastard.' Soujiro thought.
The morning went by in its usual flurry of "excitement". What with another case of severe migraines and constant shouts of 'you should be getting this right' from Mr. Shu, the entirety of the student body was looking forward to the lunch hour.
The bell rang its long, high-pitched ring and the students flowed out of the classrooms, some heading to the cafeteria and some heading to the locker rooms to check the football roster hoping for good news.
In the locker rooms it was utter chaos. Freshmen in the back were trying to jump over the Sophomores, who were trying to look under the Juniors, who in turn were trying to squirm their way past the Seniors who had somehow gotten to the front of the line first.
"Well, well, well," said Bit, "it looks like Urameshi is starting quarterback. Oh, and I'm a safety how nice, this means I get to go in and blitz and knock the crap out of you Yusuke!"
"You just try it you blonde haired………..person!" Yusuke retorted stupidly.
The roster was as follows:
QB's- Yusuke Urameshi, Youko Kurama, Jin Kazama
HB's- Hiei Jaganashi, Gary Oak, Son Goten (1)
WR's- Ash Ketchum, Soujiro Seta, Kenshin Himura, Harry Potter, Squall Leonhart
TE's- Zell Dincht, Seifer Almasly
FB- Kazuma Kuwabara, Trunks Briefs
Skipping ahead to the defense….
SS's- Bit Cloud, Mirai Trunks
FS's- Son Gohan, Cloud Strife
LB's- Ashitaka Emishi, Nuke Mononoke, Mune Mononoke
DE's- Ron Weasley, Draco Malfoy
CB's- Hworang Doo-San, Makoto Shishio
And the list went on to name the defensive linemen.
In the locker room there were whoops of joy and hollers of "WE ARE SO GONNA KICK ASS THIS YEAR!"
After the ruckus died down, most of the Seniors carefully made their way out of the locker room while trying to dodge the oncoming rush of freshmen and Sophomores.
He was in love and he damn well knew it. Ashitaka watched San walk across the cafeteria wanting with all of his being to go over to her, grab her around the waist, and kiss full on the lips. The only problem with his foolproof plan however, were her overprotective brothers Mune and Nuke.
They hounded her every step, acting like wolves, (hint, hint, wink, wink!) and scaring off any guy who got within three feet of her and tried to initiate conversation.
Ashitaka sighed in frustrated defeat. San was simply unattainable.
Soujiro Seta looked over at Ashitaka when he heard his friends depressed sigh. He followed Ashitaka's gaze and found he was once again, captivated by the Mononoke girl.
"Oh for Pete's sake!" he groaned in exasperation, "Ashitaka if you want to ask her out just go do it."
Ashitaka looked over at his friend and replied, "I wish I could. But Mune and Nuke would skin me alive if they caught me walking in her general direction!"
Soujiro could see his friends dilemma, but he had a plan. "Tell you what Ashitaka, Ketchum, Urameshi and I will go and distract Mune and Nuke while you go and ask San out."
Ashitaka still looked doubtful.
"I'd say we could guarantee you, oh, five to ten minutes. Then you're on your own." Yusuke said as he saw the still doubtful look on his friends face.
The three of them, Yusuke, Soujiro, and Ash, walked over to where Mune and Nuke sat, eating their lunch in their much preferred solitude. While walking toward them, Yusuke asked,
"Soujiro, who the hell is Pete?"
"What are you talking about?" asked a completely bewildered Soujiro.
"You know, back there, while we were talking to Ashitaka you said, "For Pete's sake!" So, yeah…I just wanted to know who Pete was."
Soujiro's eye twitched in annoyance as he sweat dropped. "Honestly, I can't see how, in this godforsaken world, Coach T. could've been sober when he put you as starting quarterback when you're this dumb."
"Huh?"
"Just shut up!"
Ashitaka looked towards his friends and saw that they had engaged conversation with San's brothers and that now he actually had the chance to talk to her. Stomach in a nervous knot and full of butterflies, he got up, somehow miraculously summoned up the courage he needed, and walked over to San's table.
Meanwhile with Soujiro's group…
They had spent about ten minutes talking to the two linebackers and Soujiro figured Ashitaka had either finished talking to San, or he had chickened out. He guessed they could wrap it up now.
"Oh!" he said in mock shock, "I just remembered something! Yusuke told me yesterday that you guys were the two wimpiest linebackers in the history of this high school, aside from Ashitaka of course."
At this Yusuke visibly paled and there were the sounds of knuckles cracking. Soujiro smirked.
"Is that so Urameshi?" Mune growled angrily.
"Well, uh…S-S-Soujiro said you guys couldn't catch him or Ketchum because you both are fat and slow!" Yusuke desperately ground out.
After this comment Nuke turned his head slowly and threateningly towards Soujiro. Soujiro gave a nervous smirk.
Ash, who had remained silent throughout this whole ordeal, wanted to beat the crap out of Yusuke for dragging him into this.
"You guys had better get acquainted to the ground because that's where you'll be spending the season." That said, the two brothers got up, threw away their food, left the cafeteria.
Nine minutes before that…
Ashitaka was walking toward San's table, there was only one problem; her friends. To many of them! Misty, Misao, Karou, Botan, Julia, to name a few.
What little courage he had managed to gather had left him, but then he remembered his time limit and, with a deep breath, he walked over to the table.
"San?" he asked timidly. She looked up.
"Yes Ashitaka?" She was surprised that her brothers hadn't already beaten the shit out of him, but at the same time she was happy. She loved Ashitaka, as did a lot of other girls, and the idea of him talking to her was a dream come true. The rest of the table fell silent at once, only helping to scare Ashitaka more.
However, "San, could I talk to you alone?" There, he had said it.
"Sure." she replied. As the two walked away from the table they heard soft giggles from its occupants. Needless to say this made both teens' hearts beat faster.
Once they had stopped, Ashitaka turned to face San and took a deep breath once more. though not as obvious as before.
"What'd you need Ashitaka?" San asked as steadily as she could, hoping against hope he was about to ask her out.
"Well, uh, umm." he stuttered. 'Damnit! Pull yourself together Ashitaka!' he shouted at himself mentally. "Well San I wanted to know if you'd like to..uh…go outwithmesometime!" he said hurriedly.
San however, deciphered the sentence perfectly. San nearly shouted her answer she was so ecstatic.
"Yes, I'd love to!" San was so happy she felt like she could fly.
"Great, so how does Saturday night sound?"
"That's fine with me!"
"Awesome, I'll pick you up around seven?"
"Sounds good!"
"Oh here, I'll give you my number, just in case something happens." said Ashitaka looking for a piece of paper. "Damn! Uh, do you have paper or something?" he asked San. She shook her head.
"Here," she said extending her hand to him palm face up, "just write it on my hand."
He got his pen and wrote the number.
"And I'll give you mine, just in case." With that she grabbed his hand and wrote her number on his palm. As she finished writing it, she realized that he really shouldn't pick her up. "Um Ashitaka, I don't think that you should pick me up."
Ashitaka looked up at her, confused.
"Mune and Nuke are a bit over protective so…" she trailed off not having to finish her sentence.
Ashitaka nodded, "Okay, how about you meet me in the park, then we'll go to wherever we're gonna go after that."
San smiled, "Alright. Saturday at seven in the park, gotcha!" And before she turned around to go back to her table, she walked up to him, and on her tip toes, kissed him gently on his cheek.
Ashitaka stared after her in shock touching his cheek in astonishment. He had just asked the girl he loved out, she said yes, Mune and Nuke hadn't seen him talking to her, and to top it all off, she had kissed him. He could die happy. He would definitely have to thank Soujiro for this.
Ashitaka sat down at his table in a still-stunned stupor. As he sat there, Soujiro, Yusuke, and Ash came and sat next to him, each with a downcast look on their faces.
"Ashitaka?" Nothing. "Ashitaka?" Still nothing. "ASHITAKA!" yelled Soujiro.
"Huh?" Ashitaka finally responded.
Soujiro smirked, "I take it she said yes then?"
All he got was a nod.
Yusuke clapped a hand on Ashitaka's shoulder, "It looks like our little Ashitaka is growing up!"
A/N: Well there you go, the next chapter in Palett High has been posted! Hope ya'll enjoyed it! As always, R&R! 'Til next time, Laterz!
HakushoRurouni
